After the chat affair

City deputy apologizes & wants to stay in office

Philipp Liesnig has to justify himself for several chat messages!

(Bild: Rojsek-Wiedergut Uta)

Further news from the SPÖ Klagenfurt's not-so-internal group chat digs the pit even deeper for the deputy mayor and his team. Philipp Liesnig now reacts to the accusations.

The Freedom Party club chairman Andreas Skorianz is "a lousy rat", writes Klagenfurt's deputy mayor Philipp Liesnig in an internal and rather exclusive WhatsApp group, the message of which was, however, brought to light. What is "bad for the city" is "good for the party" and therefore "good", as SP municipal councillor Christian Glück writes. There was also criticism of the current municipal director Stephane Binder - he was "clueless and incompetent" - and criticism of political opponents such as Julian Geier (ÖVP) and Patrick Jonke (Team Kärnten).

Liesnig speaks out
After no SPÖ official could be reached on Monday, Philipp Liesnig has now spoken out in an interview with "Krone": "I would like to apologize for the choice of words - I have already done so to Andreas Skorianz, who has also accepted my apology," the lawyer begins his justification.

Some of the published messages had been taken out of context and needed to be classified correctly: "These are messages from an internal working group. If conflicts with Team Kärnten or the FPÖ escalated again, my emotions got the better of me too," says Liesnig, who is by no means backing down in terms of content: "I have already communicated my criticism of Stephane Binder and Andreas Skorianz in public," says the criticized deputy mayor and also defends his employees and colleagues: "The picture made of Mayor Christian Scheider was not used or published - I will not punish any employees with consequences in order to artificially set an example," thus probably ruling out a sacking of district manager Jakob Grollitsch - he had sent the picture montage of Scheider to the group. The message from local councillor Glück would also have arisen in a different context.

No voluntary resignation: "Party stands behind me"
When asked by "Krone", Philipp Liesnig ruled out resigning: "I am unpleasant to certain people because I expose grievances and people try to get rid of me." He sees himself as a victim: "But I won't let that impress me - my party is behind me too," he assures. So will the chat affair remain without consequences? In any case, the WhatsApp group is no longer active; who - of the 20 or so members - apparently did not treat the chat logs as particularly confidential "doesn't matter in principle", says Liesnig, who apparently doesn't want to know whether there is a mole in his party. So will everything continue as before? "No, we will be restructuring our organizational and operational processes." So switching back to telephone communication? Once again, the saying goes: a letter is a gift.